


Heartkeeper

by NekoAisu



Series: Wondrous Tails 2020 [6]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Amaurot (Final Fantasy XIV), Amaurotine Original Character(s) (Final Fantasy XIV), Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers, Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Grief/Mourning, Nonbinary Character, Original Character(s), Other, Patch 5.0: Shadowbringers, Patch 5.0: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Patch 5.2: Echoes of a Fallen Star, Patch 5.2: Echoes of a Fallen Star Spoilers, Sin Eaters (Final Fantasy XIV), Wondrous Tails of Final Fantasy XIV (Tumblr Challenge)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-29
Updated: 2020-03-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:20:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23378263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NekoAisu/pseuds/NekoAisu
Summary: His friend appears before him in an explosion of aether. He has not stepped out of his True Form, sharp fingers so delicate with him when he grants such a blessing as touch. It feels like he is speaking in tongues when he says, “Zodiark has fallen.”Elidibus reaches for the familiar presence that sat so solidly in the back of his headspace. It is barely a flickering flame. He cannot tend it. He tastes ash on his tongue when he asks, “And what of those in Amaurot?”“Gone,” Emet-Selch says, usual monologues shortened by grief.“That cannot be.”“I know,” he replies. “I know.”
Relationships: Elidibus & Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch, Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch/Original Character(s)
Series: Wondrous Tails 2020 [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1659850
Comments: 4
Kudos: 10





	Heartkeeper

**Author's Note:**

> For Wondrous Tails prompts On A Team Together and Conflict  
> I went pretty far from them haha;;

There are clear records of the casualties caused by the End of Days. Amaurot continues to stand, though on trembling legs, and Elidibus wonders if he will soon be taken in as the Heart of Zodiark’s being. 

He would not protest, if it was asked of him.

“Why would you do that,” Lahabrea asked, “if there are yet many ways we could be saved?”

Elidibus frowned and those of the Convocation who had assembled (those that were  _ left  _ to assemble) shuffle in their seats. He is not drowning in ire. They have no reason to be nervous. 

He is simply the Emissary. He will do what needs be done. His feelings do not matter. 

The Architect, their esteemed Emet-Selch, sighs. He has lost the most and yet shows little by way of senselessness. The seat of the Fourteenth lays empty. He does not look toward it. He sounds tired when he says, “Must we have this debate? It has long since been decided.”

“By Zodiark’s will, yes,” Igeyorhm replies. “It shall be done.” 

They lapse into silence. Lahabrea glares at his papers, the draw of his mouth telling if what is obscured by his mask. 

Elidibus would be leaving them. Maybe not now. Maybe not even within the decade. 

But eventually. 

They end the meeting and call for a follow up in a week. Emet-Selch does not look at him straight on. He stares past everything even when Psyche has to guide him home. The Bureau of the Architect is  _ orderly,  _ these days. He wonders how that can be, when the world is performing its death throes all around them. 

He spots a bright, nearly starlike inflection to Payche’s soul. It bleeds the blue from it and leaves it washed out in shades of gold. He wonders if that was what Hades had called out for under claims of emergency. Those Creations of theirs were staving off much of the flood that threatened to consume Amaurot by virtue of stagnating the aether that drove such calamity—but they are still only Creations.

The Forgiven are the best of the lot, the only ones worthy of release, and stand sentinel outside their gates. Psyche still refused to clothe them even after being formally petitioned to alter their design for want of a less Amaurotine form. Such exposure is unbecoming of any upstanding scholar. 

Elidibus has seen them. They walk at half an Amaurotine’s height, some roosting like birds among the ruins of settlements and laboratories outside the city. Psyche has one they gave to Hades to design. They call it Eros.

They have never peeked inside his workshop to see what Eros looks like. They have no intention of finding out, either.

The world would cease its crying before then, they assert. There will be no need for it, aside from posing as a distraction for a grieving man. They will make it so.

Elidibus wishes he could believe in them. 

The next week proves his anxiety true. Their soul is gold and barely blue. They look at him with hunger and the Convocation is wary.

Hades calls in sick the next day. 

Psyche does not come to pick him up from the next meeting, nor the week after. Hades says they will be back soon. He does not mind waiting. They are simply doing their job.

Elidibus feels a little bad for him. He has been brought low by two losses in a row and yet strives to work past it. 

The Fourteenth has left their fair city. Psyche no longer roams the Bureau’s halls. Elidibus knows he will be next, when He wills it.

When the time comes, he will be ready. He will bring salvation to their broken land. 

(When the time comes, he will be vacant, a shell for Zodiark to fashion into a mouthpiece. He will be a true Emissary. He will not be Elidibus.)

He waits. He watches. He writes names and dates and numbers on inefficient sheets of parchment that stack up on his desk. (Three hundred and forty-four of their own. Sixteen thousand from others. His records are meticulous.) 

He receives visitors at odd hours. Though, it may as well be his perception that has caved when the sun has been swallowed and the moon left to wallow in darkness. Lahabrea drags him out to worship—though they would not dare call it that. They have no need for oblivious gods. They simply need a miracle—and bullies him into things like showers and a change of robes.

Elidibus feels he is undeserving of such care. He will be gone soon, after all. He reminds Lahabrea as much. Every time he repeats it, the notion grows ever more comforting.

Then, there is Hydaelyn. She fights against Zodiark with fang and claw, a warped attempt at succor made by those deluded. Elidibus waits to be called upon. It takes months, disasters, an entire case of paper for his recordkeeping, and a new unending inkwell before he feels a desperate tug in his chest.

It is without words that he knows. Zodiark has need of him. 

And he gives himself over gladly to become His Heart. 

Nothing happens. 

The tug sharpens to a terrible, brand-like ache. Amaurot shatters. In the chaos of the Sundering, he barely has the time (much less the control) with which to wrap himself in the space Between and take shelter. 

When he emerges, there is a great expanse of nothing. No pain. No Amaurot. No Zodiark.

He is alone. 

He wonders if he should have included himself as a casualty, in his records. Not that they matter anymore. 

From far away, a voice calls to him,  _ “Emissary, what a joy it is to have found you.” _

“Emet-Selch.” 

His friend appears before him in an explosion of aether. He has not stepped out of his True Form, sharp fingers so delicate with him when he grants such a blessing as touch. It feels like he is speaking in tongues when he says, “Zodiark has fallen.”

Elidibus reaches for the familiar presence that sat so solidly in the back of his headspace. It is barely a flickering flame. He cannot tend it. He tastes ash on his tongue when he asks, “And what of those in Amaurot?”

“Gone,” Emet-Selch says, usual monologues shortened by grief. 

“That cannot be.”

“I know,” he replies. “I know.”

**Author's Note:**

> Back at it again with sad emet hours


End file.
